Inside the Block
We're shining a spotlight on the vibrant businesses and and unique history of the Warehouse Block in Lexington, Kentucky! Every first and third Sunday of the month we're serving up a fun blend of inspiring, behind-the-scenes stories of the Bluegrass region's most dynamic district!
Inside the Block
Episode 3: Revitalizing the Warehouse Block with Chad Walker!
Join us as we sit down with Chad Walker, owner and pioneer of the Warehouse Block, as he shares the remarkable journey of transforming this once-industrial hub into a vibrant community space. Discover how his father, Randy, a visionary commercial electrician, spearheaded the area's revitalization, blending historical preservation with modern-day retail, breweries, and restaurants. Chad takes us through time, recounting the evolution of the neighborhood and the pivotal role of preserving its unique character.
Later on, the conversation shifts to Kenwick, a neighborhood that has embraced change through thoughtful design and architecture. Learn how a sense of community has flourished amidst diverse aesthetic expressions, aided by initiatives like adaptive reuse programs and accessible parking. We'll explore how Kenwick's appeal skyrocketed during the pandemic, and discuss the critical role of public spaces in fostering neighborly connections.
And of course, we weren't letting Chad get away without some details about himself. Listen as he recounts the joys (?) and quirks of farm life, local food markets, and the entrepreneurial spirit in the Lexington scene. From mischievous goats to accessing fresh produce in this area, he highlights the importance of sustainability and community support.
Hi, welcome back to Inside the Block podcast, where we focus on a different business in the warehouse block each and every episode. But today's episode is really exciting because we're actually going to be talking to. What would your job title be?
Speaker 2:Head honcho, big boss, Parking lot sweeperer toilet plunger, like basically whatever menial task that there is.
Speaker 1:That's me, yeah yeah, so, chad walker. So your dad owned the, where owned many buildings of the warehouse block, from early on, so you have always been really ingrained into this area's history, culture. Tell us how the warehouse block has changed and grown over the years. How did this particular area in Lexington start everything? Sure All right.
Speaker 2:Well, and starting my father, randy, he was a commercial electrician. He used to work out of the house. At one point he bought a house or bought a property at 333 North Ashland Avenue that's where Seasons Catering is now and when he bought that the neighborhood was in just really bad disrepair. Both properties on either side of him were just run-down garbage properties. So he bought those, fixed them up, cleaned them up, and then the properties on either side of those were run down and so he just kind of kept going.
Speaker 2:The neighborhood originally was back when the majority of it was owned by a company called JT Perry, and so Mr Perry had a lumberyard, he had his construction company, he had a general store kind of set up like a. That's where Willis-Kline is now, and it was just a booming neighborhood. And then he passed away and his kids didn't really want to continue on and so it just fell in disrepair. Nobody really paid much attention to it. Also involved with that was the john g bottling I'm sorry, the um eppings, eppings, that's it uh bottling company, which is where eppings on east side is now. That's where they got their names and there's still some equipment in there from those days where they made 7-Up and Orange Crush yes, on the vehicles, the original pictures that I have. I also touted them as selling and distributing Fall City beer and then a fledgling company at the time called Budweiser. Budweiser did not get top billing on top of the.
Speaker 1:That tiny company, a little bit of company, unheard of I don't think much ever came out of that no.
Speaker 2:But that's how it started is just sort of buying old buildings and fixing them up because it was more of a necessity.
Speaker 1:Like playing Monopoly. That's it. That's it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, except a lot more work, a lot dirtier, and you know, had to be in the middle of everything and that's I'm like joke, like I used to actually sweep the parking lots and jill and I uh mowed the properties up until just a few years ago.
Speaker 1:So I mean, we've still very hands-on, very nuts and bolts operation. I like that, yeah, cool. So from my understanding because I've done some research about this area and for like lexington's beginnings is that there was a train track that ran through it and it was a spot where they would drop on. There'd be like lumber yards.
Speaker 1:It was like a place where a lot of manufacturing would happen to be, able to help like to, because, because of its proximity to downtown, it was a smart spot to be able to like create that. So how is that? Is that culture still here? I mean the warehouse block is named warehouse because of it's these old warehouses and how like. So tell us about especially the railroad, which I'm sure was incredibly important, and then how it's grown from there because of that so, and that's kind of where it originally was.
Speaker 2:The rail um continued on down the line and it ended where the the old harold leader building is. Um, there was two spurs one one that came off right behind where Blue Door is and looped into next to White Dress, and then the other one came behind where La Petite and Mere Twin Annex is and actually went into the building. It was actually on the other side of where we're at now and pulled into the actual space and so they could offload. There was two separate offload locations. There was a mill on site, which is the building that we're across from. That was the sawmill, and so it had this kind of really, really heavy industry. Then, when we started, it was a little less of the super heavy industrial stuff and went to more like plumbers and mechanics.
Speaker 1:And when did you start?
Speaker 2:It was, I believe. My father bought his first building in 87. Okay.
Speaker 1:I think that's what it was. So this is more mechanics, yeah.
Speaker 2:Mechanics and more trade type stuff of painting companies. We had a general contractor. There was Angelusi Acoustical did like drywall and things like that and that was sort of the next generation. Then it went into more of um, like a kind of service industry type stuff. We had fitness uh places. Places did like t-shirts and things, and then the most recent sort of amorphosis of that is more the retail stuff. So we got the like Mirror Twin Brewing, some restaurants and things like that. So it's had four or five different directions.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I like that, especially in this area too, is that you can still see remnants of all the different iterations and so they coexist really beautifully, I think.
Speaker 2:We tried to keep a lot of that. There's some design things that it ends up being really cool, like where the blushery is now they've got an old interior loading dock. There's no way that anybody would build a structure that has two tiers, especially out of concrete, and a sloped floor, but because it was existing, it ends up being this really neat spot where you've got you know two great big, huge overhead doors and then you know the second level where you can kind of go above the first level and there's different sort of ways to take in the space, whereas if we just designed it anew we'd be out of our mind to do something like that.
Speaker 1:You lose all the character. I mean, I love that you're adaptively, adaptively reusing all those things because otherwise you'd just be erasing sort of the history of it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and that makes it. It ends up being a really neat design aspect where you're you're sort of married to the space, where it's okay, we have to keep this. There's no way to remove it. How do we make it cool? And so they've got this like a little balcony on the inside. Um, when we talked about the um white blush or the, the white dress place, there's some really odd spots there, but it ends up being a neat design.
Speaker 2:So so yeah, um, all of them have a little quirky thing here there. That's like design wise, you would never replicate, but because it is there, it ends up being like a focal point yeah, that's great.
Speaker 1:I mean a lot of the like, like I think, think the White Dress building is really. In fact, I just recently had dinner with some friends that were talking about how they used to go into that building before it was White Dress and like, people have like memories of that building. So it's a really unique one for the area, especially considering it has all of those, like you, kept the windows.
Speaker 1:Right, even though they used to be one-way windows, right or two, like whenever you're able to see out one way yeah, and so it's nice to you know if you'd gotten rid of that then it would have taken away a little bit of that. Yeah, lexington underground pd culture of this was a spot for it used to be.
Speaker 2:Nobody came down here when we first started fixing up because it was a rough spot and everybody I mean nine, mean nine times out of 10, if I was outside and somebody said, hey, can you give me directions to, it was always the Christmas cleaner. There used to be a cleaning company up the road and they that was the place where everybody, after they got married the brides, always took their dresses to do the thing that they preserve them for, eventually, possibly their daughter. So everybody took their wedding dresses there. Nobody wanted to know where anything else was. If you were standing outside like, hey, do you know how to get to? It's like, yeah, christmas cleaners, it's right up over here.
Speaker 1:I mean it was are they still around christmas?
Speaker 2:yeah, um, now it's yeah, it's mirror twin or eppings or something like that, but most people have gps and can get there a little bit.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but back then it was always direction to christmas cleaner what do you think is the biggest like challenge with revitalizing an area like you have?
Speaker 2:Probably having a continual vision. Like we got lucky because basically nobody wanted any of the properties down here, so and we weren't a standard developer where we come in and buy up the whole neighborhood we had to buy a piece at a um because, frankly, we couldn't afford to do anything more. So having that continuity of design, that even though each individual building looks different, you know you're in a neighborhood, you know you're in a community, and that sort of plays to some of the what I would consider the nicer neighborhoods of like uh, like if you go to Greenbrier, every house there's different but it still feels like a neighborhood. You know what I mean. Like, even though there's an individualism of each sort of property's aesthetic, it still has enough of a continuity that it works. And down here is the same way. Honestly, mintel and Kenwick and Bell Quarter like that, where the bungalows are different, and Kenwick and Bell Quarter like that where the bungalows are different, but you know they have their own artistic integrity but as a whole they still mesh sure it's cohesive still in some way?
Speaker 1:yeah, absolutely so. Speaking of Kenwick, I mean you are right on the edge of, without a doubt, the most popular happening, incredibly uh sought after neighborhood in lexington right now has and I was trying to think back to when I didn't know that. I mean I feel like covid really pushed kenwick, for whatever reason, like it's the latest hottest neighborhood yeah but was it always?
Speaker 2:no, um, and part of the problem was because it backed up to a heavily industrial neighborhood. You know a lot of the houses were. So it backed up to a heavily industrial neighborhood, a lot of the houses were.
Speaker 1:So we have you to thank? No, absolutely not. This was the last piece of the puzzle.
Speaker 2:Kenwick and Mantell and Belcourt. Of course Belcourt's always been massively sought after.
Speaker 1:Yeah, sure.
Speaker 2:Just like South Ashton Avenue, but the uniqueness of each of the houses, the maturity of the trees. You always look for nice, big, mature trees in the neighborhood.
Speaker 2:That's one of them, and then just the neighbors themselves. They're extremely involved with our neighborhood as well as with each other. They know each other's name, they go for walks with their dogs and that's just a lovely thing that you don't really find as much anymore. I had nothing against them, but I had a house um in Andover at one point and, yeah, I never met my neighbors. That just didn't happen. Um, here it's automatic, they're going to pop in and hey how you doing.
Speaker 2:You know, let me give you the rundown of the place, and that makes it really nice. It ends up being that you don't just own a house, you own sort of stock in the whole neighborhood and whether you're a renter or an owner, that extends to them the same well, and I'm giving you a hard time about you know, this being so, but I'm I'm not joking you.
Speaker 1:I have several friends who live in kenwick and one of the things that they really love not only just kenwick table and that being like a community center of sorts for them, but they do everything in the warehouse block you know, they all walk down here and they either take, you know, exercise classes, and then they'll grab a cup of coffee, or they bring all of their kids down to mirror twin.
Speaker 1:The fact that mirror twin is super family friendly, I think, is really. I mean, and it's a, it has a big family friendly vibe around here too.
Speaker 2:So it's it's too, it's like symbiotic, like these two things worked really well together, so no wonder you know this neighborhood is up and coming Since they switched away, or since we switched away from kind of like more industrial aspect. And when the adaptive reuse program came down the pipe under former mayor Jim Gray it allowed for a lot more kind of public uses like mirror twin or Epping's or popcorn paradise, la Petite, all these really cool local one-off spots that we really couldn't do prior to adaptive reuse. So it was mostly commercial so nobody came down here at night. Um, parking in the entire neighborhood is wide open.
Speaker 2:You can park anywhere and that's a nice thing completely free and there's no chance that you're going to get towed because you happen to park in front of mirror twin and you're walking over to epping's or vice versa, and that just makes it a lot nicer. Which?
Speaker 1:is a sadly a rarity, a rarity. Yeah, that's a rarity, I think everywhere, but especially this town. So what's funny too is that all whenever I come, I usually park um in front of, like behind Epping's, like near the decorator spot um rag peddler, and the first time I did it was like check our QR code for parking.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And I was like, oh gosh, okay, let me. And it was like it's free.
Speaker 2:I was like I had to get on my great I'm the only one who toes anybody and you have to be like there for weeks and somebody will call and say, hey, this car has been abandoned or whatever Gotcha, and it just makes it like nobody wants to go out to dinner and Park. Here we're going to take your firstborn.
Speaker 1:Absolutely Nobody wants that you want a friendly, welcoming neighborhood.
Speaker 2:We try to do as minimal signage as possible, so that way it's not. I don't know. It's a little abrasive. When you show up to a spot and you've got 20 different signs you've got to read that tells you all the rules of a spot. Here it's just yeah, come hang out, have a good time.
Speaker 1:Well, parking I think I was telling you this the other day too. I really like parking in this area because it doesn't take away from feeling like seeing all of the buildings. It's in little pockets, little nooks around, and it's hidden behind different buildings and stuff, and so it just you know you find a good spot.
Speaker 2:You know you're like oh this is my little spot behind Mirror Twin or whatever. Well, it lures you into. Okay, let's say you're going to Lucia's and you're going to buy something over there and you pop in and when you're finished, like well, we could really use a cup of coffee If there's a sign saying this is just for Lucia's. Well, now you got to move your car. Well instead, you can go for a walk.
Speaker 2:You go through the whole neighborhood be like that of going yeah, somebody might park in your spot for a couple hours, but they also might come to your place and, you know, give you money for a product like why would you?
Speaker 2:ever hamper that absolutely foot traffic yeah, you talk about those kids, though. Yeah, mirror twin is kid friendly, and this is yet another one of those things that I thought was like. There's so many things that I admit that I know nothing about, and one of them is kids, and so Derek came up with this idea.
Speaker 1:You don't have kids, right? No, okay, I got nieces, okay, and.
Speaker 2:Derek, the head brewer at Mirror Twin, came up with this idea. He's like. You know these kids. They run wild. Parents don't always watch them. We're going to build this cage, it's a cage. Yeah, it's for children and so it's like this little playground, so it keeps the kids with this little corral. Yes, and I was like that's the, of course I got no kids.
Speaker 1:I think I would have nothing basis on like that's the dumbest thing I've ever heard like that will never work.
Speaker 2:Love it those kids love it. They go in there and play. But the problem is is they didn't use a heavy enough gauge on the metal, because it's like a velociraptor cage, like they have absolutely gnarled through these, these toddlers that are ripping at the Hulk. Yes, the toddlers are strengthy little dudes, man, but it just shows you how destructive a kid can be. Every tine is bent apart and they're chewed off the top or whatever, but it's phenomenal, that's great. It worked wonderful. The kids love it.
Speaker 1:It keeps them from throwing rocks into the doors and things like that.
Speaker 2:But yet again, I was absolutely ousted of oh, this is never going to work, and it works wonderfully so yeah, you just never know too, and that's quite the theme in business, right?
Speaker 1:Sometimes you think this isn't, you know, there's no way this concept will work, and then it's just what Lexington needs or whatever. Have you ever given any thought to putting in any actual playground equipment anywhere?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so when we finish the parking lot, when we actually get the green light to go ahead and start it.
Speaker 1:And this is the parking lot you're talking about. That'll be right next to Mirror Twin, kind of between Mirror Twin and Blue Door.
Speaker 2:The word I keep using is and this is a total misnomer, but it's going to be a really nice parking lot.
Speaker 1:So nobody ever thinks it will work. How is it nice?
Speaker 2:Tell me lot so nobody ever thinks how is it nice, tell me so.
Speaker 1:Instead of maximizing the entirety of the parking lot, we're going to use about a third of it for a green space area, for a stage, for a pavilion playground it'll be the slab for the farmer's market, so that'll be a really nice addition to the neighborhood.
Speaker 2:And yeah, the idea is to have a spot where that you know, even when businesses are closed, people can still bring your kids and let them rip and run and tear up stuff.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Play on the train tracks whatever they want to do, it's so safe. That's great. I love that. So how many? You were telling me the other day too, how many parking spots.
Speaker 2:It'll be about 100. I think it's like 108. Wow.
Speaker 1:I mean that's significant.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh yeah, yeah, that's a good, and then that's where we'll have the block parties and stuff, so we won't have to close the street anymore. It'll be just a really nice addition to the neighborhood, totally, that's. That'll be the last piece of the puzzle, hopefully I love the idea.
Speaker 1:I think it's great. Um, speaking of the farmer's market, so when did the farmer's market? First of all? Let me tell you this. So I like to plan my time to come here on Tuesdays and Thursdays specifically so I can hit up the farmer's market. And now I have a tomato guy.
Speaker 2:I'm really proud about it. Him and I, we're pals. Everybody needs a tomato guy.
Speaker 1:He's my tomato guy. He's from Clark County.
Speaker 2:And I don't know what it is about Clark County, about clark county, but they make they grow. Probably the greatest tomatoes good made history grand. Granted, I'm getting them in the summer when they're at their like deliciousness and nobody realizes how a really good tomato like I didn't like tomatoes. I never ate neither but finally when I had one, it was the difference of you know, like a really good steak versus a garbage, like it was, oh, totally brand new yeah, and it's like I have so my entire life.
Speaker 1:Growing up as a kid, I hated tomatoes.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And then something about COVID. I had the both the Delta and the Omicron variant.
Speaker 2:And.
Speaker 1:I think something like that really messed me up, and afterwards I was like I've been missing out this whole time. It like really changed the makeup of like my taste buds, and so now I love tomatoes and so this is why I'm really glad I have the tomato guy. But it must have been also before.
Speaker 2:I must have just been having like winter tomatoes oh yeah, like who would do this see, I cheated because I I didn't like tomatoes and I convinced myself I didn't like them. But I like cheese and so mozzarella, like oh yeah, I'll just put a massive thing of mozzarella with this little thing and you get a caprese salad and it sort of lured like, okay, this is acceptable is acceptable.
Speaker 1:Let's have a little less cheese and a little more tomato, like a gateway drug, that's right, so I was slowly like okay, maybe I do like tomatoes. Yeah, but I do. I like tomatoes now. Well, there's no greater flavor combination than a caprese salad.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:It's like those, like basil mozzarella and tomatoes were like meant to be. Tomatoes and onions are in everything like them in some capacity, like they just you know, oh, I've never not loved an onion though, yeah, but the farmer's market, the difference between a kroger tomato and one from my tomato guy from clark county unparalleled oh, yeah, just just incredible, and so how did the farmer's market come to be like? Did you lure them over from downtown or I'd been working on them for years like a long, long, long time Okay.
Speaker 2:There's something I really believe in is what I always joke about is I don't really care about farm to table. I want farm to retail is to actually get some of these farmers paid and it's a lovely thing to be like, okay, farm to table, but we really want those guys to be able to continue on to be kind of a sustainable business. And it's difficult in Fayette County because the land's so expensive. So you get Clark County but we the original concept I pitched to them gosh 15 years ago was an actual drive-through farmer's market, and the thing that always bothers me about like going downtown is you go and buy produce and it's a lovely thing, but you might have to walk 15 blocks and nobody's gonna buy parking, that's it.
Speaker 1:Nobody's gonna buy a watermelon. Honestly, I love the downtown farmers market. I love that it's at tandy park and the fifth third pavilion and I think it's a great. There's so many of them. It's a great concept, but what turns me off so often, because I'm I'm already coming in for like kind of a drive is like man, man, I'm going to have to figure out how to pay for parking too, and it's already fairly crowded.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah.
Speaker 1:Here you're in, you're out. Sorry, go on. Oh no, and there's plenty of parking.
Speaker 2:So we reached out to Josh England, who's their executive director, and through a bunch of, like you know, farmers are used to getting taken advantage of. So they immediately are like okay, what's he really up to? What's he going to charge us? Like nothing, you guys, just come down, set up, I'll build you a pavilion eventually. This is going to be great, you know, at least for the interim. Just come set up, because they were losing their spot where the central bank lot is, and so that kind of created an opening. They needed a place to go and it needed a place to go, and it's been wonderful. Well, I take it back. It's been pretty good. The non-good part of it is is that now my father-in-law will call and be like hey, do they have kale today? I'm like I have no idea. Well, call Josh, and so I'll call.
Speaker 2:Josh like yeah, we got kale. How much you want a few pounds hang on, and so I gotta leave and go shopping for my father-in-law, but yeah, it's a block away from the office, so I'm okay with that.
Speaker 2:It's wonderful. But having them there and having him in such close proximity to the neighborhoods that really appreciate him, like Belcourt and Kenwick and Mantell, it just was across the board, no question. And I will tell you this too. Josh told me that when they finally voted on it, like after a lot of like kind of walking in circles around each other and feeling each other out, he said they finally got to the point where it's like okay, are we going to go to national avenue? And he said that was the first unanimous vote that the farmers uh ever had, with the exception of the vote to adjourn meetings.
Speaker 1:He said otherwise like that's the only one that's ever unanimous.
Speaker 2:He said yes, everybody voted unanimously to come down.
Speaker 1:So why do you think that they were so into the idea?
Speaker 2:I think it's just a perfect fit for them. There's people that are in the neighborhood, businesses and residences alike that will utilize their product, and so I think it's just going to get bigger. And it's honestly, closer proximity to farmland itself. I mean it's 10, 15 minutes from our home and that's farmland, so it's just great. We love having them down here and selfishly I walk around the neighborhood and get all these smells and they're actually cooking down there and it's just like all these good things.
Speaker 1:I haven't been they had.
Speaker 2:The one guy was cooking some kind of burger and I don't remember if it was like lamb or ostrich or what, but he was putting beer cheese on it and like awesome goodness ostrich with beer cheese.
Speaker 1:Yeah, done well. When I was at the woodland art fair recently, I'd forgotten how much I like roasted corn. It was one guy one tent and the only thing he. I love it when people do one thing, really, really really well like they're not spreading their self himself, then and the line was you know, because and it's quick to get it for you because he's been rosy and he dunks it in this huge thing of butter and then you take it next to the, the table next to you, and it's just all seasonings, you know so like I went ham on all these seasonings, I need to talk to my clark county tomato guy about.
Speaker 2:Maybe we're gonna get into the dipped corn biz and that's the thing it makes it nice is that we we've done this of almost like a food tour where you can go to eppings or you go like have you done a food? Tour of where else? Yeah, um oh gosh, uh uh. What's her name?
Speaker 1:um oh uh bites of the bluegrass yeah, yeah, yeah, I couldn't remember her name.
Speaker 2:Yeah, um, she did a tour down here, said it went really well. One of One of these days I'm going to do what I'm I've been like. My working title is the Million Dollar Tour. And it's going to be like this tour of like. Basically I'll guide it, we'll walk you through and have tastes and experiences of everything in the neighborhood, all the behind the scenes.
Speaker 1:Amazing.
Speaker 2:And we'll do it as like a charity. So we're trying to get people that would be about doing that Like, okay, how much would you pay for a ticket? $100, $500, whatever Totally and really make it a big fundraiser. Yeah, like give every nickel to a worthwhile charity.
Speaker 1:I love that.
Speaker 2:That's on the book as soon as I get a little time I'm going to do that one.
Speaker 2:Let me help you with that one so start at epping's, do a little bite there, and then where would you go um? I mean, definitely, yeah, definitely, mirror twin. Uh, nick makes those uh like baked avocado, which is best thing in the world, and you go across the street and get a macaron from sylviana. Totally, you go get um. Their big signature is the bourbon caramel popcorn at popcorn paradise. Okay, really good. My personal favorite is the chicago mix. It's like popcorn, it's caramel and cheddar popcorn together.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like the salty and sweet. That's it, yep.
Speaker 2:Then you know, maybe go to the Blushery for one of their.
Speaker 1:Froze. Froze is a good stuff, yep.
Speaker 2:Blue Door Smokehouse is always on the list, yep, of good stuff. Yeah, blue door smokehouse is always on the list, yep. Uh, if he's making it, the s'mores sake at void is.
Speaker 1:I haven't been to void yet and I'm dying to go. I love their branding, I like their vibe and turn like they do all these little markets oh yeah like they like, like really fun yeah, they like, like you know, they think of fun, unique events to kind of put on and it's kind of niche and I think it's so. There's a s'more flavored one, though.
Speaker 2:He does a s'mores. He's done passion fruit, does he?
Speaker 1:make sake there? Oh yeah, Well, not there.
Speaker 2:He makes it up the street. But yeah, it's like two blocks away. Oh, I didn't fermenting, yeah, of the rice, and wow. And then, of course, wild lab, uh, with chad's place. Awesome stuff, totally, and even like lucia's has fair trade chocolate and so yeah, it's, that's really cool. Um gosh, everybody's got food in the neighborhood it's all good stuff.
Speaker 1:I know, I know you could do. It would be an epic food tour yeah for sure like a wine, because you have such a wide variety.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it's all, all uh, local. You know it's organic, it's so. Some of them are even to the extent of like fair trade or beyond organic, um, and they're all small businesses yeah, I know, I was just thinking about how we don't have a single chain. I was about to say I, I can't.
Speaker 1:It's really unique that it's all mom and pop kind of shops.
Speaker 2:I think that's great.
Speaker 2:Derek, we were just telling this story the other day. But, derek, when they can for Mirror Twin in the 720 building right across from my office here, every once in a while he'll call me and say, hey, we're canning today and we're doing this or that. And so, yeah, the very first time they ran the machine, he called and was like you know, hey, you want to come have a beer? Right off the machine, it's like 1030 in the morning. Hell, yeah, dude. And so it's not even marked. I've still got the can in my office. It's just an aluminum can.
Speaker 2:And of course we eat cheers or whatever. I haven't done this before. But it's just a cool thing and the one he was doing was a fundraiser for I think it was Lexington Humane Society. It was some sort of dog cat and yeah, they gave proceeds to them and he'll actually make a beer for you. I mean, if you come in and go, yeah, I want this for a wedding. I have a minimum amount, like whatever They'll work with you and he's a mad scientist, he's always coming up with crazy stuff.
Speaker 1:He's always out doing that is always coming up with crazy stuff. He's always out doing that, that's right, yeah, I mean, I just went right before the filming of this. I went over to grab a coffee at La Petite and he's out there lugging his own kegs and stuff and I'm like, you're the owner, I like that.
Speaker 2:You know You're one of the hardest working guys. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:I'm looking forward to doing an episode with him because I think it's quite the operation.
Speaker 2:He's tons of energy, super positive. Just a really cool guy we like Derek.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for sure, that's great. So what about you got the parking lot slash? Green space on the horizon. Any other plans?
Speaker 2:here or there, no, and then you're done, done forever. That's it Just going to drive around in a golf cart like an old man and yell at cars yes, you can't park there, yes, except you can, because everything's free.
Speaker 1:That's right, that's right.
Speaker 2:No. You know, yeah, they're redoing or not redoing. They're going to do a development on Midland Avenue. It's going to be five stories of apartments. Basically, oh dang, it's going to be awesome. I think that'll be a great feeder for the neighborhood. It'll be a good symbiotic relationship.
Speaker 1:The building. No, not the building. I think the building that's on Midland where Manchester Coffee is is.
Speaker 2:Lexington's version of the Flatiron building in New York because it's got that, those wild angles, but not so, not that one, not that one, no, so this is the old Lexington cut stone and so it's right across from the Met and it'll be between here and the old Lexington Herald Leader building okay cool, um, so I can't remember the size of it, but yeah it's gonna.
Speaker 2:They're gonna build up um, they're gonna have apartments I don't remember if I'm assuming's going to be more than just single bedroom. Really nice design, though. Really good people who are working on it, and that'll be good for the neighborhood. I think it will be good for them as well, because people can walk back and forth and with Farmer's Market you can get everything that you need I mean it's a cool thing and it's organic and it's so delicious. Like you said, it's good tomatoes.
Speaker 2:You know the best tomatoes um the only other thing I've kind of got on the horizon this is a pilot project that I've had in the works for a while is going back to the um farm to retail. What I really want to do is find just a little spot in the neighborhood that we can set up a pickup drop-off location for csa's and then also kind of like a self-serve grocery that's will you explain the concept of CSA to me Sure.
Speaker 2:So what it really ends up being is like let's say, I own a farm and I'm growing corn and tomatoes and all the good stuff we just talked about. You pay in to be essentially a partner in that farm. So if the bounty is plentiful you get more stuff. If it's not the best year, then you don't, but you essentially pay the same cost either way you get a taste of being a farmer which they have to deal with, Right.
Speaker 2:And you get all these really good. So the one we belong to is Elmwood Stock Farm in Georgetown. It's wonderful that you can just drive by and see the farm from the place that you're actually eating, that you're putting your mouth and our eating, that you're putting around, and our pickup location is, uh, the little seafood um spot over in chevy chase, um, and not to take away from them, but a really to have multiple csa's to be able to set up, because there are several in a grocery store type setting, uh, even if it's just as big as this room totally, and then have like a membership card where you can swipe it and come in and also buy more tomatoes.
Speaker 2:Like a co-op, absolutely Love that the model that I saw for it came. They do it in Europe some places and have found that, yeah, because you don't have someone actually standing there checking you out that there is some theft, but the offset is because you don't have that person's salary. That, okay, you know it's organic and not many people are going to steal. So you might lose four to six percent, but the cost of that person sitting there all day doing nothing is more than that totally and if somebody honestly needs a tomato or stick a corn, go ahead, take it.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean right, right and the I've seen this before in shows they, who you can also, you know, have some sort of a cut off of your what you pay into if you volunteer, like it's all run by volunteers like the owners themselves. Yeah, so you, you know, pick one Saturday to kind of, you know, sit there and hey. I would love it yeah, yeah yeah, as an extrovert, I'd be like, yeah, let's talk about tomatoes yeah, you know I think that's great yeah let's talk about tomatoes all day.
Speaker 2:That's a fun part.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's a great concept. So where would it maybe go? In Down the road, yeah, down the road.
Speaker 2:It'll be on National somewhere. It may just be a seasonal thing, and I tell this concept because if somebody else wants to do it, go for it, do it. The whole goal is to help out farmers Totally, and so if somebody wants to hock, that it's yours, tag it.
Speaker 1:Sure.
Speaker 2:Don't care, sure.
Speaker 1:So I think some people know about your warehouse block, who you are here, but who are you away from?
Speaker 2:the warehouse block.
Speaker 1:Let's talk about Chad Walker behind the scenes, all right. So you are married to a wonderful woman named Jill who. I have yet to meet, but I'm dying to.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Jill's great.
Speaker 1:And well, does she want? This needs to happen. And then you also have a bunch of goats, so let's talk about your goats.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I've got goats, dogs, chickens, ducks.
Speaker 1:How big is your?
Speaker 2:property A cow. It's right under 100 acres.
Speaker 1:Under 100?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's 98,. I think 98 and a half 30 of that. The organization Seedleaf utilizes that for their grow program.
Speaker 1:I didn't know that. Yeah, it's really. That's awesome.
Speaker 2:They've got a big dinner coming up. I don't know how to call it, but they call them this the Congolese. We have a bunch of folks from the Congo. There's like 12 families out there and they're doing a big uh grow and they're gonna have a dinner coming up, which is what excites me like yeah use all the land you want, as long as I get invited to dinner like I'm good with that absolutely. And then yeah, the the goats how many goats do you have?
Speaker 1:six, six goats and are they those really cute little ones?
Speaker 2:no, no, no. Goat is cute, they're awful. All goats are awful creatures.
Speaker 1:They're bad, they do have an odd look in their eyes. I was looking at a goat the other day and I was like there's something off about you, there's no wonder that most of the times that the devil is depicted, especially in early lore, it's always a goat because they're awful creatures, they're just bad. Totally.
Speaker 2:Bad. Did you get that? Yeah, bad.
Speaker 1:Nice, good one.
Speaker 2:Yum, we got the goats because we have chickens and ducks and geese and they lay eggs and we eat the eggs and we give them to friends and family. And we were getting a bunch of chickens were getting eaten by coyotes.
Speaker 2:So we put up a fence. The coyotes hopped the fence. So this is right in the middle of the pandemic. Jill did kind of a deep dive and found that Anatolian shepherds are great for protecting creatures, that's just their guardian dogs. So she found a breeder and the breeder said well, they don't really like to protect chickens, they like to protect livestock.
Speaker 2:Oh man so you need to go get some goats and the dogs will protect the goats and, by proxy, protect the chickens. Wow, I said this is a middle pandemic, was like we ain't getting no dog, we sure aren't getting goats. Yeah, and of course, yeah, you want to know their names, but I lost that one massively um, as I usually do, sounds like it. Um yeah, we've got a male goat named Mater.
Speaker 1:Mater, uh-huh, oh, from the cars, no, no.
Speaker 2:He was just. He had a brother named Tater, so there was Tater and Mater.
Speaker 1:Oh, I love it.
Speaker 2:Mater didn't, I'm sorry, Tater didn't make it, unfortunately.
Speaker 1:What happened to Tater?
Speaker 2:He, we don't really know. We took him to the vet and the vet explained it. This is the comic relief of it. But the vet explained that the goats are always looking for a way to die. And it's true, they're always out doing something horrible, trying to like off themselves.
Speaker 1:And so we don't know what happened Out of sheer, like stupidity or like on purpose.
Speaker 2:They're just mischievous. They're really smart, but like we, we were very like our farm. We don't use like any pesticides, we don't even use weed, kill anything. It's 100% organic and that's a lovely thing. And we also go and get organic feed from these Amish organization called coffee K-O-F-F-I, and we have to go once a month to Georgetown to pick up bags and bags of this super organic feed. But the stupid goats, like what they like to eat are Amazon boxes. So we go above and beyond to make sure that they have the best quality of life, best quality food, and they're like as soon as the Amazon guy drops up. So they're just awful, they're rotten creatures. Jill loves them. Jill loves them so much. But yeah, so there's Mater. Okay, there's Luis, mary Jo.
Speaker 1:Now Luis has been prominently featured on your Instagram and. Tiktoks recently.
Speaker 2:She has, yeah, and so is Mater, mater's the number one, mater's number one, yeah.
Speaker 1:Is he the only male? Yeah, okay, well, of course.
Speaker 2:There's. There's, uh, della Mm. Um, she named one Chadetta because it talks a lot like me, so yeah. And then there's itty bitty, itty bitty baby Betty. Betty's the little bitty one and it's absolutely adorable. I think I got them all Louise Chadetta, mary Jo yeah itty bitty baby Betty.
Speaker 1:Well, so yeah you did say that one was cute. You just said that Betty was cute. Yeah, yeah, yeah, betty's cute, I'd hang on to Betty.
Speaker 2:Betty's okay, yeah, she's.
Speaker 1:She's sweet and happy and jumpy like they get all wound up once a day and they, but Betty was cute.
Speaker 2:Yeah, betty's cute.
Speaker 1:I'd hang on to Betty.
Speaker 2:Betty's okay, yeah, she's sweet and happy and jumpy. They get all wound up once a day and they run around and do this jumpy, kicky girl dance party thing and it's wonderful to watch. And then they go back to being goats and they don't eat weeds like they're supposed to. They eat Amazon boxes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, that's what I've always heard is that if you have pasture or some acres, you get goats to essentially be lawnmowers.
Speaker 2:But they don't. No, they don't, that's not. They don't do their job. It doesn't work out.
Speaker 1:And they faint. Right, they're fainting goats. Yes, they're fainting goats.
Speaker 2:I've been reprimanded multiple times for driving by the fence too fast on the lawnmower, because it looks like all of them were just murdered upside down. Their legs are up. And I'm laughing, I'm falling off the mower and then I get in trouble so I'm not allowed to do that anymore.
Speaker 1:It's hilarious, though, but how, how quickly does a fainting goat get up after it faints?
Speaker 2:it depends on the level of the faint so gotcha, and they don't actually faint they. Um, it's kind of like if I hit around a corner and jumped out and scared you like everything go tense, that shock that's what to them. But it can also happen when they get excited or they get mad, and so it used to be like Jill would walk to the fence and give them a treat. Well, they knew treats were coming, so they come running down the field.
Speaker 1:And they get so excited and they fall over. There's just a lot of goats that look like they're laying dead in the field. These goats and I have a lot in common, though I'm finding out more and more. I hate jump scares and I love love treats, so yeah, and me too.
Speaker 2:We brought Itty Bitty to. She accompanied Santa when we did Santa at Mirror Twin, which was wonderful and Mater has made a couple of appearances at. I think he's the one that actually came with us to the Intel Easter Egg Hunt.
Speaker 1:Now, did you play Santa at Mirror Twin?
Speaker 2:I did.
Speaker 1:How do you feel about playing Santa? I think it's a blast.
Speaker 2:I think every fella or anybody. Honestly, anybody can play it, because anybody can make their voice a little bit deeper and ho, ho, ho, but it's a blast. You get all this attention and love from children, you're a celebrity, and even though they don't realize I'm not Santa, I'm still getting all the wonderful things, so it's just like a great ego boost. Unfortunately, though, I did get the Easter Bunny costume, and I am typecast as Santa because I cannot fit in the Easter Bunny costume.
Speaker 1:Was it like a slim, fit Easter Bunny?
Speaker 2:No, I'm just big, and it was mostly the head I couldn't get. I got a big, big head.
Speaker 1:Your head was too big for the Easter Bunny. Yeah, okay, all right. Well, I mean after playing Santa.
Speaker 2:So we had a young thespian by the name of Trent who he's a wonderful young actor up in Winchester. His father owns Eclectic Alchemy and just really super nice guy Hardcore about owns Eclectic Alchemy and just really super nice guy hardcore about playing the Easter Bunny.
Speaker 1:He really really takes it seriously, like jumps around he's.
Speaker 2:Easter Bunny for a week beforehand to get into character he. So when we played for Mintel one year he played Easter Bunny. We left and when it was all wrapped up we got a text from this lady that said that you missed us. Like we were driving through the neighborhood and had a picture of her little kid sitting out in a lawn chair just waiting for Easter Bunny. I'm like, oh, we can't leave this kid.
Speaker 2:So my father's got this old Humvee, this old H1. And so I'm like Jill, will you please play Easter Bunny? He's like absolutely. And so I'm like Jill, will you please play Easter Bunny? He's like absolutely. So she costumes up, we drive through town with her in the back of the Humvee and she's jumping and kicking in the car with her honking and stuff. And we went and made that little guy's day Like it was the best thing ever. He's hugging her.
Speaker 2:He got his own show for Easter Bunny, so glad. But yeah, it would have been awful to be like year like yeah, no, can't do that definitely so yeah, it was a blast full service around here it's funny how, when you costume up whether it's easter bunny or santa you become that person you know, and yeah, jill 100 became easter bunny, like she was that play today.
Speaker 1:So well, you also get to like hide behind a persona a little bit yeah yeah, so it's fun to yeah yeah you can kind of see why some people are like really into that culture because you get to be somebody else.
Speaker 2:My father's got an old 1929 Highboy, which is this fire engine, red, hot rod, open wheels, convertible, no top roars. I mean, it's a really fast vehicle and that has become the Santa mobile, so I'll ride that around town oh fun All downtown. I've got a little speaker that I play and it's just to see people's reaction is just a blast, because they're like, oh man, that's the coolest thing ever.
Speaker 1:That's great. It would be fun to do a parade down National sometime. It would be a short, quick little parade.
Speaker 2:You can go back and forth, just loop it, absolutely.
Speaker 1:We should start thinking about parades.
Speaker 2:I think that would be a fun thing to do. It's always fun, yeah, good deal good deal.
Speaker 1:Well, anything else you'd like to say on inside the block podcast?
Speaker 2:no, no, no, I'm glad that you guys are doing this and I think it's a wonderful thing for the neighborhood. Yeah, I think it's fun and I yeah hugely appreciate you guys uh, inviting me on oh for sure. So the businesses are way more interesting than the behind the scenes. No, I think the behind the scenes is.
Speaker 1:I mean, it's fun to see how you know the sausage is made, so to speak I mean like this, didn't?
Speaker 2:this area didn't come to be like all on its own you know, I'm sure you've had a lot of challenges throughout the years, and I'm sure your dad did too you know we made a whole bunch of mistakes but we try to need to see, try to learn from them, the iterations of it yeah, well, you should know this too.
Speaker 1:Is that, and not to blow smoke up, your?
Speaker 1:you know what, but like every person that we I've interviewed so far or that we've gone and done a show with you know they want to have you on, they like to talk with you, know they and they have nothing but the nicest things to say.
Speaker 1:And a lot of that is because there are business owners who will come to you and say I have this really great idea and you'll find them a spot. And then you'll, even though you know they don't own that building that they're in, they're renting you'll go above and beyond to customize that building for whatever their shop is or whatever you know they're selling, and that's especially at white dressress and others. They really talked about how, like that means a lot to them, because they were actually in a different place in Lexington where it was really just a business whenever they had rented before, and here it's a family and it's a community and I don't think I mean I think people can really get the vibe of that here, but you don't know until you hear stories like that. So you should feel good about what you're doing around here.
Speaker 2:It's been a bunch of years getting to that point.
Speaker 2:You're a good businessman, I guess I'm not as good as I should be in classic business sense, because it's profit-driven and with me it's. More of this is where my office is. I want to be able to walk around the neighborhood without being inundated with you know, here's problems, you, you messed this up or whatever. Like I want it to be with everybody, it needs to be symbiotic. We all need to feed off of each other. You know used to be well, I still do this, but like when somebody would come in and say we want to lease a space and you know I'd give them a speech about the neighborhood and how it means or whatever, and then say go talk to anybody. You know, don't just talk to the list of people I give you.
Speaker 2:Go talk to any tenant and not all of them are going to be like 100% champions, but it's going to be in that 98%.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean Definitely.
Speaker 2:And if it's anything bad, it would probably be because of me personally for whatever reason.
Speaker 2:It's not going to be anything, that the neighborhood's not great or that it doesn't feel right or that things aren't fixed it's. You know, sometimes we just don't matter. But 100, go talk to anybody um, tell them what your experience was, and you know that's fine. I, I used to do this too. I don't do it as much anymore, but there's um, if the space was empty, I would just. You know, I'm not very good at sales and so I. It's absolutely the lowest pressure ever, but I gave him a key and just like go in the space. Oh, wow, uh, you know, I'll show it to you, but come back the weekend, come back with your wife or husband or whatever, yeah, yeah To like and just feel out was one instance when I did that and jill and I had gone to dinner that night, pretty much.
Speaker 2:Uh squatters, they still live here no, it wasn't that, but jill and I had gone to dinner and it's like a saturday and we're looping back through just kind of checking on things and we see lights on in a space that's supposed to be vacant and it's like, well, we better go in and turn the lights out and see what's going on. And it was this couple who, um, they had just moved from, from California. They had a fairly extensive wine collection, and we go in the space and they're drunker than skunks. There's the two of them and their Basset Hound. All three of them are drunk.
Speaker 1:And the Basset Hound, and the Basset Hound. The Basset Hound is drunk too. Amazing, amazing.
Speaker 2:And they were like we're taking a space. By the way. I'm like, okay that Make sure to turn the lights off After hours, but that was a little bit of a shock. But yeah, I think the basset hound drove him home, so it should have been okay he was the least. Yeah, he was okay. So, yeah, I don't do that as much anymore because, yeah, other reasons.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't blame you Live and learn.
Speaker 2:That's right. That's right. Good learning experience.
Speaker 1:Yeah, ideas I love it well. Thanks again.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely had a good time, so I am gonna make you be on again.
Speaker 1:Um coming up because I'm doing a lot. I'm I've completely fallen in love with eppings the building oh yeah the, the bottling manufacturer, like. I just think it's a great cool lexington story.
Speaker 2:That is not cold enough is the man? He's absolutely. Yeah, I cannot wait, so I think we should interview him together.
Speaker 1:I want you on that episode for sure, um, because you know a ton about the building as well yeah and you know he can really talk about the concept behind like them taking that and moving it up to. So we'll do the eppings one very soon, because I think it's just such a it's probably in terms of it being like a brick building, you know of prominence. It's probably one of the most important ones in this area, don't you think it is?
Speaker 2:And to have those guys in there is like to me. I don't get like all excited about celebrities. I get excited about Lexington. Celebrities like really, and those are the people that when Cole first talked about like renting, it was like oh my God, it's Cole. Like Cole's been down today and now I know him really well, but I still have that like he's right there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, he's a great chef.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah so he's, he'll be, he'll be phenomenal talk to.
Speaker 1:He is absolutely unflappable, um cool as a cucumber always but yeah, well, you have to be in a kitchen, you do?
Speaker 2:but like, say, our little place in winchester. We've it's a little 50 seat restaurantseat restaurant, and I always feel like it's chaotic and Cole, on the other hand, he was attending an event we were throwing one time at Epping's and he just walked out of the kitchen. Just you know, hey, how's it going guys. I'm Cole and just had a conversation and went back. Never upset. You know it's incredible. It's absolutely. You have to be born to it.
Speaker 1:He's really amazing the same thing with like there's certain professions like that that it's crazy that that's just like your every day. Yeah, yeah, like my mom recently dislocated her elbow and so I had to take her in and they popped it back in place in the hospital like hall and it was just like you know, these orthopedic guys any other day to them, you know we're all you said.
Speaker 1:Just I love you know people that are really good at what they do, like you said, like you're born for stuff like that, yeah, that'll be a good one I can't wait okay I'll get that one scheduled right, brandon. He's giving me a thumbs up. Okay, until next time on inside the blunt podcast.